It was a good debut for Syed Fazaluddin, who made his debut in front of an adoring father, Syed Nayeemuddin. A little later, Prahlad Srinath, who at 393 is within breathing distance of Mahesh Bhupathi (372) in terms of ATP singles rankings but still with miles to go in terms of achievement, also made a winning debut. Making it a good outing were Nitin Kirtane and Fazaluddin who completed the rout by winning the doubles against Sultan Kahifan and Mohammed Ali al-Shoud 6-1, 6-1. Earlier in the singles Fazal (568) beat Mohahammed Ali, still unranked on the ATP rankings, in straight sets 6-2, 6-1. There was as little fuss when Srinath trounced Sultan Khaifan al Alawi 6-1, 6-2 in just over an hour.

``Sure we missLeander,'' said Jaideep Mukherjea for the umpteenth time in the past few days, and then added, ``this team will learn a lot from shouldering the responsibility without him. They did well in Asia Cup and there is no reason why they cannot do it here.''

But there must be some kind of unease in him as he readies himself for a battle against Pakistan in the quarter-finals. At the Asia Cup in Delhi, Pakistan's Aisam al Qureshi (776) had stretched Bhupathi some way before losing 4-6, 5-7, while the 22-year-old Mohammed Khaliq beat Srinath. India pulled off the tie in the doubles. So, when the two teams clash here there will be a lot of scores to be settled and Pakistan in the end would like the result to be reversed and for India that could be a disaster considering they are the defending champions.

In the other matches today, Pakistan had a scare from the Phillippines, whose Bryan Junino stretched Mohammed Khaliq to three sets before losing 7-6 (5), 5-7, 4-6. But Aisam Qureshi beat Joseph Lizardo 6-2, 6-4. TheFilipinos, Lizardo and Michael John Misa beat Khaliq and Qureshi 6-2, 6-3 in the doubles.

In another match of the lower half Indonesia beat Kuwait 3-0 with Bonit Wiryawan beating Mussad al Jazzaf 6-1, 6-1 and Sulistyo Wibowo beating Mohammed Ghareeb 7-5, 6-1. In the doubles the Indonesians beat their rivals 6-0, 6-3. Japan, the second seeds had a bye.

In the top half Uzbekistan and Korea had a bye, while Chinese Taipei beat Iran 3-0 and Thailand trounced China by an identical margin.

NIRUPAMA, UZMA OUT: Her teammates had a Birthday cake ready for her back in the Village, and then as her singles match of the women's tennis competition progressed, Nirupama Vaidyanthan may even have begun to visualise an unexpected icing on it. After leading 5-1, she had three set points before the World No 57 Indonesian Yayuk Basuki clawed her way back into the match and went on to win it 7-6 (2), 6-3.

Earlier Uzma Khan, troubled by a stomach muscle pull -- which she tried to play down -- squandered a 5-3 lead in thefirst set and lost 6-7 (2) and then simply caved in the second 0-6. In the doubles, Liza Andriyani and Irawati Moerid beat Manisha Malhotra and Sai Jailakshmy 6-3, 6-2 to complete the rout.